Lauri Clements, MS, RS

Environmental Health Division

Olmsted County Public Health

Rochester, MN 55904-4722

Biography

Lauri Clements currently serves as an Environmental Health Specialist at the Olmsted County Public Health Department, Environmental Health (EH) Division in Minnesota. She is responsible for; public health assessments of food, lodging, pools, and recreational licensed establishments; past coordination of the environmental health team’s self-assessment and gaps analysis process, and packaging of that information for upcoming state evaluation; assisting the EH team in communicable disease outbreak investigation and prevention activities; membership on the cross-functional team implementing new environmental health software for the division; assisting the Environmental Management Team and Public Health Leadership team with planning for the environmental portion of the upcoming community health risk assessment. She also served in the Safety Officer position for the public health emergency response command center group, including planning for employee safety for past H1N1 mass vaccination clinics.

Lauri has over thirteen years in the field of environmental health, starting as an Environmental Health Specialist in Brooklyn Park, MN. She moved to the Trempealeau County Health Department in Wisconsin to develop a new environmental health program for the county. After two and one half years as an Environmental Health Specialist, she was promoted to Public Health Programs Manager, a position held for an additional five years at Trempealeau County. Then after two years in private industry, Lauri returned to the environmental public health field by accepting a position as Environmental Health & Water Lab Supervisor for the Teton County Public Health Department in Wyoming. Lauri moved on from Wyoming to accept the current Environmental Health Specialist position at Olmsted County Public Health in Minnesota.

Lauri is a member of the Minnesota Environmental Health Association. When a member of the Wisconsin Environmental Health Association, she served on the Board of Directors four of seven years of membership. In addition, she was the 2007 Committee Chair for the NEHA Regional Conference planning committee.

Lauri is a Registered Environmental Health Specialist with both the State of Minnesota and the State of Wisconsin. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Public Health from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and a Master of Science degree in Risk Control (Industrial Hygiene emphasis) from the University of Wisconsin-Stout.

Leadership Development Opportunities

My experiences as an EPHLI fellow have greatly enhanced my personal and professional development. Through the use of a combination of individual personal assessment tools, including the Change Style Indicator, Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, and SkillsScope Development Planning Evaluation and Guide, in conjunction with advice from the program coaching sessions, I was able to create an Individual Leadership development plan to capitalize on my strengths. For example, the Change Style Indicator identified my strengths as; liking ambitious but realistic goals, showing an appreciation for people who are “big picture” thinkers and being willing to promote a shared team/organizational vision, valuing use of a team approach to solving problems, readily sharing information and conveying confidence in co-worker’s ability to do their job, and willing to explore both sides of an issue. Becoming more aware of not only my preferences and potential challenges but also my strengths allows me to make the most targeted and effective contributions to a variety of professional opportunities.

In addition, I appreciated exploring the process and approaches of systems thinking, and greatly appreciated the many application examples and perspectives provided by the various presentations, coaching sessions, and mentors. The systems thinking approach especially supported the development of a cross-agency communications model for emerging issues and will also help me in the development of a community environmental assessment process. Clearly, systems thinking tools will be of great value during my professional career, especially in the areas of continuous improvement, strategic planning, and problem solving.

In addition to the two – week long classroom learning opportunities and reading materials, the webinars and distance learning offerings (e.g., conflict resolution) were also very worthwhile, as were the opportunities to engage the wealth of experience held by other EPHLI fellows. It is a great opportunity to have been able to and continue to network with some of the best environmental public health professionals in the nation. And, I am indebted to my EPHLI team members (Aaron, Rebecca, Vivian) and mentor Adele for the help and encouragement during my project development. Thank you team for always asking many “why” questions that greatly improved our projects and systems thinking abilities.